Justice Department releases largest batch yet of Epstein documents, says it totals 3 million pages

NEW YORK (AP) — The Justice Department on Friday released many more records from its investigative files on Jeffrey Epstein, resuming disclosures under a law intended to reveal what the government knew about the millionaire financier's sexual abuse of young girls and his interactions with rich and powerful people such as Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department would be releasing more than 3 million pages of documents along with more than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images. The files, posted to the department’s website, include some of the several million pages of records that officials said were withheld from an initial release in December.

Included were documents concerning some of Epstein's famous associates, including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Britain’s Prince Andrew, and email correspondence between Epstein and Elon Musk and other prominent contacts from across the political spectrum.

The documents were disclosed under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law enacted after months of public and political pressure that requires the government to open its files on the late financier and his confidant and onetime girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. Lawmakers complained when the Justice Department made only a limited release last month, but officials said more time was needed to review additional documents that were discovered and to ensure no sensitive information about victims was released.

Friday's disclosure represents the largest document dump to date about a saga the Trump administration has struggled to shake because of the president's previous association with Epstein. Criminal investigations into the financier have long animated online sleuths, conspiracy theorists and others who have suspected government cover-ups and clamored for a full accounting, demands that Blanche acknowledged might not be satisfied by the latest release.

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Journalist Don Lemon charged with federal civil rights crimes after covering anti-ICE church protest

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Journalist Don Lemon was released from custody Friday after he was arrested and hit with federal civil rights charges over his coverage of an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a service at a Minnesota church.

Lemon was arrested overnight in Los Angeles, while another independent journalist and two protest participants were arrested in Minnesota. He struck a confident, defiant tone while speaking to reporters after a court appearance in California, declaring: “I will not be silenced.”

“I have spent my entire career covering the news. I will not stop now,” Lemon said. “In fact there is no more important time than right now, this very moment, for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable.”

The arrests brought sharp criticism from news media advocates and civil rights activists including the Rev. Al Sharpton, who said the administration of President Donald Trump is taking a “sledgehammer” to “the knees of the First Amendment.”

A grand jury in Minnesota indicted Lemon and others on charges of conspiracy and interfering with the First Amendment rights of worshippers during the Jan. 18 protest at the Cities Church in St. Paul, where a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor.

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ICE claim that a man shattered his skull running into wall triggers tension at a Minnesota hospital

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Intensive care nurses immediately doubted the word of federal immigration officers when they arrived at a Minneapolis hospital with a Mexican immigrant who had broken bones in his face and skull.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents initially claimed Alberto Castañeda Mondragón had tried to flee while handcuffed and “purposefully ran headfirst into a brick wall,” according to court documents filed by a lawyer seeking his release.

But staff members at Hennepin County Medical Center determined that could not possibly account for the fractures and bleeding throughout the 31-year-old's brain, said three nurses familiar with the case.

“It was laughable, if there was something to laugh about,” said one of the nurses, who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss patient care. “There was no way this person ran headfirst into a wall.”

The explanation from ICE is an example of recent run-ins between immigration officers and health care workers that have contributed to mounting friction at Minneapolis hospitals. Workers at the Hennepin County facility say ICE officers have restrained patients in defiance of hospital rules and stayed at their sides for days. The agents have also lingered around the campus and pressed people for proof of citizenship.

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Judge blocks additional citizenship provisions in latest setback to Trump's election executive order

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A federal judge on Friday blocked certain federal agencies from requesting citizenship status when distributing voter registration forms, the latest blow to a wide-ranging executive order on elections President Donald Trump signed last year.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington ruled that the Constitution's separation of powers, giving states and to an extent Congress authority over setting election rules, are at the heart of the case.

“Put simply, our Constitution does not allow the President to impose unilateral changes to federal election procedures,” wrote the judge, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton.

Specifically, Kollar-Kotelly permanently blocked two provisions of the executive order that sought to impose proof-of-citizenship rules.

Her decision said agencies will not be allowed to "assess citizenship” before providing a federal voter registration form to people enrolling in public assistance programs. It also said the Secretary of Defense cannot require documentary proof of citizenship when military personnel register to vote or request ballots.

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Venezuela announces amnesty bill that could lead to mass release of political prisoners

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez on Friday announced an amnesty bill that could lead to the release of hundreds of prisoners, including opposition leaders, journalists and human rights activists detained for political reasons.

The measure had long been sought by the United States-backed opposition. It is the latest concession Rodríguez has made since taking the reins of the country on Jan. 3 after the brazen seizure of then-President Nicolás Maduro in a U.S. military attack in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas.

Rodríguez told a gathering of justices, magistrates, ministers, military brass and other government leaders that the ruling party-controlled National Assembly would take up the bill with urgency.

“May this law serve to heal the wounds left by the political confrontation fueled by violence and extremism,” she added in the pretaped televised event. “May it serve to redirect justice in our country, and may it serve to redirect coexistence among Venezuelans.”

Rodríguez also announced the shutdown of Helicoide, a prison in Caracas where torture and other human rights abuses have been repeatedly documented by independent organizations. The facility, she said, will be transformed into a sports, social and cultural center for police and surrounding neighborhoods.

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A Sudanese doctor recounts his harrowing escape from a Darfur city under rebel bombardment

CAIRO (AP) — Dr. Mohamed Ibrahim dashed from building to building, desperate for places to hide. He ran through streets littered with bodies. Around him, the capital of Sudan’s North Darfur province lay enveloped in smoke and fire.

Explosions, shelling and gunfire thundered from every direction.

After 18 months of battling, paramilitary fighters had overrun el-Fasher, the Sudanese army’s only remaining stronghold in the Darfur region. Ibrahim, who fled the city’s last functioning hospital with a colleague, said he feared he would not live to see the sun go down.

“All around we saw people running and falling to the ground in front of us,” the 28-year-old physician told The Associated Press, recounting the assault that began Oct. 26 and lasted three days. “We moved from house to house, from wall to wall under non-stop bombardment. Bullets were flying from all directions.”

Three months later, the brutality inflicted by the militant Rapid Support Forces is only now becoming clear. United Nations officials say thousands of civilians were killed but have no precise death toll. They say only 40% of the city’s 260,000 residents managed to flee the onslaught alive, thousands of whom were wounded. The fate of the rest remains unknown.

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Mine collapses in eastern Congo, leaving at least 200 dead

GOMA, Congo (AP) — A landslide earlier this week collapsed several mines at a major coltan mining site in eastern Congo, leaving at least 200 people dead, rebel authorities said Saturday.

The collapse took place Wednesday at the Rubaya mines, which are controlled by the M23 rebels, Lumumba Kambere Muyisa, the spokesperson of the rebel-appointed governor of North-Kivu province told The Associated Press. He said the landslide was caused by heavy rains.

“For now, there are more than 200 dead, some of whom are still in the mud and have not yet been recovered,” Muyisa said. He added that several others were injured and taken to three health facilities in the town of Rubaya, while ambulances were expected to transfer the wounded Saturday to Goma, the nearest city around 50 kilometers (30 miles) away.

The rebel-appointed governor of North Kivu has temporarily halted artisanal mining on the site and ordered the relocation of residents who had built shelters near the mine, Muyisa said.

A former miner at the site told The Associated Press there have been repeated landslides because the tunnels are dug by hand, poorly constructed, and left without maintenance.

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Israeli strikes kill 23 Palestinians, including children, as Gaza ceasefire inches forward

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Hospitals in Gaza said Israeli strikes killed at least 23 Palestinians Saturday, one of the highest tolls since the October ceasefire aimed at stopping the fighting.

A day after Israel accused Hamas of new ceasefire violations, strikes hit locations throughout Gaza, including lethal ones on an apartment building in Gaza City and a tent camp in Khan Younis, officials at hospitals that received the bodies said. The casualties included two women and six children from two different families. An airstrike also hit a police station in Gaza City, killing at least 11 and wounding others, Shifa Hospital director Mohamed Abu Selmiya said.

The series of strikes also came a day before the Rafah crossing along the border with Egypt is set to open in Gaza’s southernmost city. All of the territory’s border crossings have been closed throughout almost the entire war. Palestinians see Rafah as a lifeline for the tens of thousands in need of treatment outside the territory, where the majority of medical infrastructure has been destroyed.

The crossing's opening, limited at first, marks the first major step in the second phase of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire. Reopening borders is among the challenging issues on the agenda for the phase now underway, which also include demilitarizing the strip after nearly two decades of Hamas rule and installing a new government to oversee reconstruction.

Still, Saturday’s strikes are a reminder that the death toll in Gaza is still rising even as the ceasefire agreement inches forward.

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Thousands face another arctic blast without power as East Coast preps for a storm

NASHVILLE (AP) — Frustrations were bubbling up Friday for the tens of thousands who have been without power for nearly a week in the U.S. South as a new storm looms, including Tennessee's residents in Nashville, where the utility was criticized for storm preparations and recovery.

Terry Miles, a 59-year-old construction worker whose home has been without power since Sunday, said he's using a fish fryer for heat and is worried about carbon monoxide.

“I’m taking a chance of killing myself and killing my wife, because why?” Miles said after attending a Nashville Electric Service news conference intended to showcase the utility's repairs on poles and lines. He then pointed to officials.

“I came up here to speak my mind because I’ve been so cold," he said. "This is the coldest and worst I’ve ever been in my damn life.”

Crews have been working by ground and air to restore the lingering outages as another storm is predicted to hit the East Coast, threatening near-hurricane force winds, heavy snow and flooding, while arctic air moves into the Southeast.

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Catherine O'Hara, Emmy-winning comic actor of 'Schitt's Creek' and 'Home Alone' fame, dies at 71

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Catherine O’Hara, a gifted Canadian-born comic actor and “SCTV” alum who starred as Macaulay Culkin’s harried mother in two “Home Alone” movies and won an Emmy as the dramatically ditzy wealthy matriarch Moira Rose in “Schitt’s Creek,” died Friday. She was 71.

O’Hara died at her home in Los Angeles “following a brief illness,” according to a statement from her representatives at Creative Artists Agency. Further details were not immediately available.

O’Hara’s career was launched with the Second City comedy group in Toronto in the 1970s. It was there that she first worked with Eugene Levy, who would become a lifelong collaborator — and her “Schitt’s Creek” costar. The two would be among the original cast of the sketch show “SCTV,” short for “Second City Television.” The series, which began on Canadian TV in the 1970s and aired on NBC in the U.S., spawned a legendary group of esoteric comedians that O’Hara would work with often, including Martin Short, John Candy, Andrea Martin, Rick Moranis and Joe Flaherty.

O'Hara would win her first Emmy for her writing on the show.

Her second, for best actress in a comedy series, came four decades later, for “Schitt's Creek,” a career-capping triumph and the perfect personification of her comic talents. The small CBC series created by Levy and his son, Dan, about a wealthy family forced to live in a tiny town would dominate the Emmys in its sixth and final season. It brought O’Hara, always a beloved figure, a new generation of fans and put her at the center of cultural attention.

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